


Vanilla

by Ally147



Category: Hunger Games Series - All Media Types, Hunger Games Trilogy - Suzanne Collins, The Hunger Games (Movies)
Genre: Acquaintances to Lovers, F/M, mentions of minor canon character death, mores2sl fall 2016, shoddily researched vanilla cultivation, with all the silly misunderstandings the trope demands
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-15
Updated: 2017-04-15
Packaged: 2018-10-19 03:53:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 11,399
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10631619
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ally147/pseuds/Ally147
Summary: An extremely vanilla story, in every possible way.Written for MoreS2SL Fall 2016





	

**Author's Note:**

> Many thanks to Kanames Harisen for the initial beta (and American-ing up) on this story way back in October, 2016. I've since rewritten and tweaked parts of this story, so any remaining errors are my own.
> 
> Anything recognisable is the property of Suzanne Collins, Scholastic, and Lionsgate and probably a few other people in between. I don't own anything - I merely borrow with love.

Of all the beautiful things he ever learned to bake, Peeta always found cupcakes the most rewarding. The most _powerful_.

 

Every day, children clamor to press their noses up against the cabinet glass to catch a glimpse of whatever pop culture phenomenon he’s chosen to immortalize in frosting that day: he pipes the symbols of superheroes, the faces of cartoon characters, the colors of sports teams. He delights in the giggles, the whispered declarations of _awesome_ , and knows he’s been a bright spot in someone’s day. Sometimes that’s all children need: one little thing to make them smile, and he’s more than happy to provide it.

 

Today’s batch, though, will be topped with delicate violets and asters and lavender sprigs, bordered with filigree lace piped in his most steady, careful hand. Not for children—he assumes—but for a ladies’ garden party, ordered by a chirpy, effervescent woman with the tallest blonde beehive he’d ever seen.

 

Not that that makes them any more or less meaningful. Cake is cake is cake and all of it is wonderful.

 

Peeta empties the last of the bottle of vanilla extract into the soft-yellow batter and bites back a smile; running low on vanilla—he’d never let himself run dry of it; there’s still enough bottles of it in the fridge to close out today and probably the next—means a visit to the one person in the state who grows and presses the beans into his version of black gold.

 

Peeta shakes his head and focuses his mind on the rhythm of the stirring; he can’t let himself get distracted. It’s easier when his hands are busy, piping delicate details onto cakes, working doughs into breads, folding hundreds of flaky layers into pastry. The bakery is full of distractions, distractions he has taken full advantage of since he was old enough to need them.

 

He loses himself in the mixing and the pouring, in making each cake as uniform as possible, in the musical rhythm of the mixers, the soft, out-of-tune singing of his father beside him, and the rattle of the oven timers. The warmth of the place envelopes him like a blanket, and he could well fall asleep in its embrace.

 

“We’re running low on vanilla,” says his father. He pops the seal on a jar of the vanilla paste—the second to last one, Peeta thinks, not that he’s keeping count or anything—and takes a heaped spoonful of it, dropping it into a bowl of whiteness soon to become Chantilly cream for the mini chocolate and almond _mi-cuit_. “Someone ought to pay Katniss a visit soon.”

 

“I’ll go,” Peeta volunteers, too quick to be overridden and so _completely_ _hopeless_.

 

His father chuckles. “I gathered.”

 

The day drags on with the promise of a visit to Katniss. It doesn’t matter how many times he’s made the trek to the other side of town to see her, to enact a transaction they’ve been taking part in for years now, the prospect never loses its power over him. He’ll be as excited to see her as a child on Christmas day forever.

 

When the last customer leaves for the day, Peeta turns the ‘closed’ sign over with a heavy sigh. It’s been a long time since he’s had to pull a twelve-hour shift; the aches in his body and the tension of anticipation don’t agree with him at all.

 

“Go now,” says his father from behind him. Peeta turns and finds him with a broom in hand, warm smile on his lined face. “You’re no good here.”

 

“But the cleaning,” Peeta protests, though his heart is only half in it. His objection hasn’t even spilt from his mouth before he’s tugging his apron over his head and wrangling it onto its hook.

 

His father shrugs. “Your brother had two hands at last count. I’m sure he’ll manage.”

 

From the kitchen, his brother’s muffled voice yells out, “Hey!”

 

His father chuckles while Peeta makes a beeline for the door. “Thanks, Rye!” he calls out.

 

“Screw you, Peet!”

 

Peeta laughs and sails towards the door, skipping on air for how light he feels.

 

His father calls back after him, hauling him back down to Earth. “Oh, and Peeta?”

 

Peeta stops himself at the door. “Yeah, Dad?”

 

“Will you still be coming by for dinner tonight?”

 

 “And miss out on your spaghetti? Not a chance, Dad.”

 

“Glad to hear it. And son? Don’t forget the vanilla this time.” He tosses in a wink for good measure. _Once_. It happened once that he went and came back empty-handed. Peeta feels the tips of his ears burn, but it’s been a long time since he’s been surprised at how perceptive his father and brothers are.

 

Peeta sprints through the empty parking lot and slides into his car, switching on the ignition and pulling out onto the quiet street. He winces against the late afternoon sunlight and pulls down the visor; it’s late enough now that his favorite shade of peachy-orange sky has given way to something bright and blinding, garish and beautiful at the same time with its neon fire.

 

He steers the car off the road to a dirt path that leads down towards the woods and into the poorer Seam area, where the Everdeen house is tucked away and out of sight. He’s never understood why the townspeople railed so against the area—where the town’s tiny population got the audacity to pass such vicious judgment is beyond him, too. He’s always believed that there was something special about the Seam; so green it almost glows, set with wildflowers the color of jewels. Such a marked contrast to the artificiality of the inner town.

 

The Everdeen house itself is small, but the hothouse out back is huge, looming as he comes up the driveway and halts near the rusted mailbox.

 

Peeta slips from his car and ambles around the back, stepping over flowerbeds and along wide herb gardens. It’s well-kept now, lawn mown and gardens neat. It hadn’t been so only a few short years ago. Weeds lining the driveway went to seed and overran everything, blanketing the yard and drive in a sea of yellow dandelions while Katniss scraped by at the college three hours away. He’d never heard she was leaving. He never thought she was coming back.

 

Which made it all the more poignant when she did, vanilla pods and extracts in hand, proposing business once more. It brought the Everdeens and Mellarks full circle, in a way; Everdeens had always supplied Mellarks with vanilla. First Alder Everdeen, old and gray in his hazy memories and gone well before Peeta even started school. Then Rowan Everdeen, taller even than Peeta’s own father, ready with a smile and a joke for anyone. The smell of vanilla radiated off the man, and off the pretty, tiny girl who followed him with two long braids falling over her shoulders, capturing his heart with her silver-gray eyes and gap-toothed smile while he hid behind his father’s legs. When he saw her in school a few short weeks later, he declared to his father that he would marry her, the girl who smelled like cupcake batter and had voice so beautiful it put the birds to shame.

 

Not long later, when Mr. Everdeen passed on, Peeta watched that happy, smiling little girl turn into someone else: two braids became one, smiles turned to scowls, lightness turned heavy and stoic and cost her all her friends. Not that Katniss seemed to mind all too much; she ate her meals alone and came and went with little fanfare. No one noticed her, and she didn’t notice them.

 

Peeta had tagged along to the funeral with his father and watched as the family tossed vanilla pods onto the coffin. He’d followed suit, catching Katniss’ eye over the grave, trying with all his nine-year-old mind could muster to decode the puzzling look her storm-gray eyes shot at him.

 

After that, strings of friendship as fragile as spun glass grew between them, when it suited her for the most part, and that suited Peeta just fine. If they only ate lunch together once a month, that would be enough.

 

They’re friends now, he supposes, though when it comes to Katniss he’s always taken the title with a grain of salt. They know each other’s middle names and surface level things about each other’s lives. He’s happy to take what he can get from her: needless, shallow little things that are far better than nothing, like how her favorite color is green and her favorite juice is apple.

 

He comes to a stop at the hothouse door, white paint peeling and littering the ground like dirty snow, and knocks three times. “Hello?” he calls out as he pushes inside.

 

The heat of the hothouse overwhelms him, nothing at all like the dry heat of his ovens; here, the rich scent of earth, the sweetness of the snowy-white orchids, the potent warmth of fresh vanilla, and the damp, sticky heat of the shed is something else altogether.

 

He hears a gentle humming from somewhere near the back. He follows it further in, taking the narrow path through the verdant green.

 

“Katniss? Where are you?”

 

“At the back,” her familiar, smoky voice calls back. He follows it to a tiny office—if you could even call it that—at the back of the shed, obscured from view by a door just as green as the life around him.

 

He pushes open the door to find Katniss on the other side, dressed in filthy jeans and an even filthier white shirt, a single braid, black as a raven’s wing, falling down her back to the curve of her waist. A silent sigh leaves him, like one always does when she’s around, stark with relief and calm.

 

She holds slim, green, unripened pods up to the light, against a ruler on the wall, then tosses them into one of the baskets lining the far edge of the desk. Grading them, she told him years ago when curiosity got the better of him. The biggest and best would be sold as whole pods, while the others would be blended and steeped to make the extracts and pastes. She’d offered to show him how she does it once, but the thick, warm scent around them, Katniss’ husky murmurs and the forced proximity of an office built for one did him in far too fast.

 

He thinks he knows how to grade them, but damn it all if he remembers anything else she tried to teach him that day.

 

The tune she’s humming is a familiar one, the notes of an old folk song from the area they all learned their first day at school. He can recall with perfect clarity the day she sang that song for their class, all those years ago. Not the words so much, but the sound of them, and the high and sweet pitch of her voice as she sang for all the world to hear.

 

“No Vanilla Ice?”

 

The hums cut off. She turns with no particular urge or hurry and gives him a wry look, complete with arched brow and scowl, neither with any real heat behind them. “You think you’re being funny, don’t you?”

 

He chuckles and rubs at the back of his neck. “Not if you don’t think so.”

 

“Not today I don’t.” Katniss dusts her soil-covered hands off on the dirty rag hanging from the waist of her jeans and leans against a small fridge in the corner, covered by planters and soil samples. “What can I do for you, Peeta?”

 

He coughs to clear his throat. “I need more.” Her eyebrow arches even higher. _Fuck._ “Extract, I mean,” he clarifies, his words running together in a ramble. “More vanilla extract. I ran out this morning.”

 

Her slender shoulders shake with her gentle laugh. “How much do you need?”

 

“How much do you have?”

 

She looks at him a beat too long before tugging open the door and ducking into the fridge, letting out a tiny draught of cool into the air. “Four essences, three extracts. A dozen jars of paste, too.”

 

“Would it be too presumptuous to ask for all of it?”

 

Without missing a beat, she says, “Not at all.” She tugs the bottles out with soft little glass-on-glass clinks and lines them up on the sliver of bench space above her. “It might be a little while before I can get anymore ready, though.” She gestures to the bottles along her wall, full of pods steeping in alcohol. “These ones won’t be ready for another few weeks.”

 

“It’s fine.” As she rustles around on her desk for a bag, he tells her, “I’m sorry, just coming here and cleaning you out like this.”

 

Katniss shakes her head. “It’s fine, Peeta. It’s all for you anyway. You’re the only one who buys it.”

 

He cocks his head to the side. “Seriously, no one else?”

 

She smirks at him. “What, you think this tiny little town is teeming with gourmets? Nope. Just you.”

 

“And you don’t use it?”

 

“Uh.” Her answering chuckle is thin, nervous. “I don’t so much not use it as I just... hate it.”

 

“You hate vanilla?” He’s never been more confused; didn’t she return to their tiny town to start growing it again? “Do you even have a soul?”

 

Katniss gives him a wry look. “The smell of it. The taste is fine, I guess, but the smell of it is disgusting. And sometimes…” She peters out, her breath hitching and wavering before she goes on, low and quiet. “Sometimes Prim would wear vanilla-scented perfume; it always gave me a headache.”

 

He feels something in him stutter at the mention of her sister: the tiny, blonde pixie of a girl who lost her battle with leukemia when they were still floundering through middle school, all but taking their mother with her.

 

“I’m sorry,” he says.

 

She shakes her head. “Don’t be. You have nothing to be sorry for.”

 

He takes a deep breath in of the pungent, vanilla-coated air around them. It’s thick, almost syrupy with it, like you could swim through the flavor. “It’s everywhere.” He wants to ask her how she stands it, having that reminder with her every day, but he bites his tongue.

 

She seems to glean his meaning anyway. “I know. It’s all right.”

 

But maybe it’s not as all right as she says, because she lapses back into silence as she slips the bottles into a cloth bag, sticking strips of cardboard between them as a buffer.

 

“What do I owe you?” he asks.

 

“Fifty’s fine,” she says. She’s still not looking at him, like the lack of eye contact will be enough to make him overlook the fact that she’s been lowering the price every time he’s come by, even when he buys more.

 

But Katniss is still the stubbornest woman he’s ever met, and he’s not sure he could ever win an argument against her, so he keeps his mouth shut. Instead, Peeta reaches into the back pocket of his jeans and plucks out his wallet. The notes inside are crumbled together, thrown in with no regard for neatness or organization, so it’s easy to slip a little something extra in without her knowing until it’s too late.

 

Peeta drops the cash onto the bench and takes the bag from her outstretched hand. Her fingers catch on his as she pulls back, sending a jolt of something warm through him. She pulls her hand away like it’s been burned; did she feel that, too?

 

He clears his throat. “Pleasure doing business with you.”

 

She nods, a little too quickly. “Always.”

 

Then it’s weird again, like once the transaction is complete, they’re done. Finite. Please proceed to the nearest exit.

 

So he does. But this time she follows. Not just to the door like she would any other day, but all the way out and back down the driveway to his car.

 

It’s silent, but not uncomfortable. New, but not unfamiliar. As they trudge along the well-worn path, side-by-side, hands brushing but neither moving away, Peeta can’t help but think they’ve crossed some sort of boundary between them, but God only knows what boundary it is.

 

“You should come by sometimes,” he tells her as he sits the bag down in his back seat, taking care to prop each bottle upright. He sounds like a broken record; some version of this speech always comes out as he leaves, a poor substitute for all the other things he’d like to ask her. “The bakery, I mean. You’re always welcome.” He holds up the bag. “Maybe taste the things we make with your stuff?”

 

And she shrugs, like she always does, never with enough of a hint to tell him if it’s a disinterested shrug or just non-committal.

 

“Maybe,” she says. Before he can make another play for his case she turns back the way they came, never once glancing back.

**XXX**

It’s a habit after he sees Katniss; it’s like his hands can’t rest— _won’t_ rest—until he’s captured her on paper.

 

She’d run if she ever saw his dozens of notebooks, all filled with any number of things that make his fingers itch—the nearby meadow in full bloom, a striking face, the sharp lines and sloping curves of the architecture in the city, random blending of colors in swatches, the smiles of the children leaning in for a better look at his cupcakes—but still, more than anything else, _her_.

 

He’s documented her in varying levels of ability since he was a child. His drawings are innocent enough; the sway of her braid, the line of her waist. When he was much younger, it was the hollowing of her cheekbones as she starved. When he was much, it was the sway of her narrow hips and the length of her legs. He could never bring himself to draw out the modest lines of her breasts without breaking out in a flush so hot he wasn’t sure he’d ever look normal again.

 

Today it’s her face, and her lips twisted in the scowl he now thinks of as being innate to her, as fundamental as her arms or legs. He couldn’t begin to count how many times he’s drawn this exact expression but it wouldn’t matter if he could; no matter how many times he does, it’s never perfect; there’s always something _missing_.

 

And he can never tell what that _something_ is.

 

Peeta reclines against his pillow, his room lit by low, yellow lamplight, and sets a charcoal pencil to the pages to try again in a quest for perfection he knows is hopeless, but can’t help but strive for anyway. Time falls away as lines and curves and shadows flow out from him in a portrait he thinks might be one of his best yet.

 

It could be the pinnacle in his quest for perfection, but it wouldn’t matter either way. He’ll draw her again and again. Always try to capture her contradictions, her newness and her oldness, her softness and her hardness.

 

It’s an addiction, he knows, but there are far worse things to be addicted to.

**XXX**

Peeta doesn’t expect to see Katniss again so soon. She hasn’t set foot in the bakery since before her father passed away, and his buying everything in bulk tends to negate the need for visiting any more than necessary. So when he finds her standing in the middle of the storefront late that morning, scrutinizing the contents of his cabinets and fridges, scant days after he saw her last, he isn’t sure what to say.

 

“Hey,” he settles on, dusting loose flour from his hands. Safe, non-intrusive.

 

She clears her throat. “Hi.”

 

“Can I… um… can I get you anything?”

 

Her gaze pans back down to the cabinets, perusing the contents in a smooth, unbroken line. “Do you still have the cheese buns?” she asks.

 

“The cheese buns?” he repeats.

 

“Yeah, the little scroll things with the cheese and herbs? My… my dad used to get them for me. When I was little. They were really good.” She casts another glance up and down and frowns. “Do you not make them anymore?”

 

He shakes his head before remembering how that might look. “No! I mean, yes! Yes, we still have them. They’re still in the oven. More of a lunch thing.”

 

She stares down at the floor, bites at her lip. “Oh.”

 

“They won’t be long,” he assures her. “Would you like to wait? Get one when they come out? They’re better when they’re hot.”

 

Her gaze darts back and forth like she’s warring with herself, though Peeta hasn’t a clue what could be causing her such conflict; it’s a pastry, not a marriage proposal.

 

“Okay,” she says after a long, divisive moment. She sets herself down on one of the sturdy wooden chairs and folds her hands in her lap. He tries not to look so surprised but it wouldn’t matter if he did; her gaze is focused with near laser-precision on the faded, peeled stickers covering the table’s surface.

 

“All right.” He glances at the clock on the wall; each tick seems to slow to half-time. “They’ll be done soon. Do you want a drink or anything while you wait?”

 

“I’ll be fine,” she says. And then: nothing.

 

It’s not this awkward between them any other day. Even at the worst of times, he’s managed to save them with idle chit-chat—and when they’re at her house she’s calm, at ease—but today his brain is pulling up nothing but blanks; the weather, the price of gas, his oldest brother’s newfound allergy to dogs and subsequent break-up with a girl who happened to own three. There’s no one else in the shop besides the two of them, and one glance down the barren street beyond the window tells him it’ll be staying that way for a while.

 

Ever the coward, Peeta forces a smile Katniss doesn’t see and ducks back into the kitchen to peer into the ovens. The buns need another five minutes or so, but the cheese has melted and the bread has browned and they smell incredible. Close to two decades he’s spent in or around the bakery and the smell of it never gets old.

 

He peeks through the window of the door and watches her. She doesn’t pull out a phone or anything like that. She’s present in everything she does. It’s admirable, and so different from everyone else their age.

 

The timer goes off with a loud, obnoxious clatter. Peeta fumbles with the towel he’s holding and knocks a pot of utensils of the bench, the tinny echo of it rattling in his chest and all around him until it’s the only thing he can hear.

 

“Shit,” he mutters, bending to retrieve them.

 

“You all right in there, Peeta?” Rye calls from the back office.

 

“Fine,” he yells back. “Just… fucking… fine.”

 

Peeta kicks the utensils under the bench—he’ll deal with them later—and slides a pair of oven mitts over his hands. Bulked-up hands make difficult work of the old-fashioned oven doors, but he gets there in the end, a burst of steam hitting him in the face and robbing him of his sight for a brief, terrifying moment that he’s never managed to get used to. He reaches into the ovens blind and pulls out the tray of cheese buns, all lined up in neat, even rows, and sets them down on the steel bench behind him.

 

He plucks two buns off the tray with fingers his father jokes must be coated in Teflon to stand such heat and drops them onto a paper plate. He tucks a folded napkin under them and sprinkles a dash of fresh chives on top. Why he’s trying to garnish the damn things is beyond him.

 

When he pushes back out of the kitchen to the tiny dining area, he’s surprised to see her still sitting there, tearing a strip of paper into tiny little squares. She had to have heard the cacophony in the kitchen, and even without that, she’s fled from him often enough before; he wouldn’t be surprised if she fled again.

 

He sets the paper plate in front of her, the grease from the cheese seeping through and turning it transparent, and takes a step back. “Here you go. Be careful with it; it’s still hot.”

 

“Thank you, Peeta,” she murmurs, staring at the bun. He nods and moves to leave, halted when Katniss reaches out and sets a hand on his forearm, hotter than any oven tray, searing her print onto him. “Would you… sit with me for a bit?” she asks.

 

If she can tell he’s shocked, she hides it well. “All right,” he says. He wipes his hands off on his apron and falls into the seat across from her. “Was there something you wanted to talk about?”

 

Katniss shakes her head, her coal-black braid swaying with the movement. “Nothing in particular. Just… kind of wanted the company.”

 

He grins at her, so wide it hurts his cheeks. “Then company you shall have.”

 

She’s silent for a good few minutes as she picks at the bun, tearing off chucks and popping them in her mouth. He tries not to be too obvious as he watches the flex and curve of her lips, and the tiny peek of pink with each swipe of her tongue.

 

“So, have you been busy today?”

 

Peeta almost jumps; all that focus on her mouth and he’d not even noticed the words forming.

 

“What? Oh, I… um. Kind of? In the morning, yes, but not… not so much, you know, now.”

 

He recalls giving presentations back in school, always receiving full marks for eloquence and delivery. God only knows where that skill’s gone now.

 

A flicker of a teasing smile lights her face as she looks around at the empty shop. “I can see that.”

 

“Well.” He clears his throat. “What about you? Are you busy?”

 

“Not in the slightest.” She takes another bite of her cheese bun and sighs. “I was just in town today and saw you were open.” She laughs to herself. “I’d never wanted anything more than I wanted a cheese bun when I was standing outside earlier.”

 

He grins. Something else to add to the meagre list of things he knows about her: _craves cheese buns sometimes_. “So, is it as good as you remember?”

 

She takes another bite and nods. “Better, actually.”

 

Pride puffs him up like a peacock. “Good to know. It’s my perfected recipe you’re eating.”

 

She quirks a brow at him. “Are you always so boastful? They’re just cheese buns.”

 

His hand flies over his heart, his look of indignation only half-feigned. “ _Just_ cheese buns, Katniss? You wound me with your indifference.”

 

“I’m not indifferent. Just realistic.”

 

“Well, realism is harsh.”

 

A sad smile pulls at her lips. “That it is.”

 

She offers nothing else after that. And just like that it’s _weird_ again.

 

He’s staring at the pile of torn paper she made when without warning, she pushes back from the table, rattling it on its uneven legs. The plate is empty; not even a crumb remains. “The buns were delicious, Peeta, thank you.”

 

Puzzled, Peeta stands after her. “Anytime.”        

 

“How much do I owe you?” she asks, reaching into her pocket for a small, zippered purse covered in multi-colored, sparkling sequins. He stops himself from laughing; never in a million years would he have ever envisioned Katniss Everdeen with an accessory like _that_.

 

He shakes his head instead, but the smile that peeks through is involuntary. “Nothing. On the house.”

 

She scowls at him. “Seriously, Peeta. How much?”

 

“I am being serious, Katniss. Your money’s no good here.”

 

She stands straight, trying on an intimidating stance that might have worked on him in school but has no chance now. “Oh? But you’re allowed to pay me far more than I need? Do you really think I don’t notice when you do that?”

 

An incredulous laugh leaves him in a burst. “You undercut yourself something terrible, Katniss! Fresh vanilla—home-grown and pressed to boot—runs at least twenty bucks a jar. Each! All up you charge me less than five!”

 

“Because you’re a frequent customer!”

 

“I’m your _only_ customer!”

 

He holds her gaze until hers drops. She lets out a sigh and waves an arm through the air. “Fine.”

 

He grins. “Fine.”

 

She sighs. “You’re infuriating; you know that?”

 

“I’ve been told so on occasion, yes.”

 

“Clearly not often enough. You might have changed your habits earlier.”

 

“What, and give up the chance to annoy you? Not on your life.”

 

She shakes her head and takes a step towards the window, where sunlight is streaming in to drench the room in vibrant gold, haloing her in light from behind. His fingers itch with the urge to capture her on paper, again. His mind is already blending the colors for the warm, latté hue of her skin, the deep, golden-brown the sunlight turns her raven-black hair, the startling gel-pen silver of her eyes. Then, in a slow, measured turn, her lips quirk up in a smile he doubts he could ever say no to, that changes her face into something catastrophic, in the best way possible.

 

“You didn’t hear a word I just said, did you?”

 

Peeta shakes his head, dragging himself back down from the clouds. “Huh?”

 

“Didn’t think so.” She sighs and shoves the sequined purse—he’ll have to drag the story of that thing out of her one day—back into her pocket.

 

“Hold on; what did you just say?”

 

Katniss shakes her head. “It wasn’t important. I’ll see you around, Peeta.”

 

As she turns for the door, one word rises in his throat and spills forth:

 

“Wait!”

 

She pauses with her hand poised at the door, turning just her head to face him. “Yes?”

 

His hands start to sweat at her expectant expression, the soft tease disappearing from her eyes now that he’s holding her back, making her wait. He takes a series of slow deep breaths, in and out in an even rhythm.

 

“Katniss,” he begins, his words two decades in the making. “Would you like to have dinner with me this weekend?”

 

The words come out of him in an unfiltered rush, but the stark eternity of silence and the look of shock that follows makes him certain she heard him.

 

He expects her to say no. In every scenario that’s ever played out in his head of this exact moment, she’s always said no. Never in a harsh way, but always dismissive, which is far, far worse. He’s trained himself for this moment, clenching his fists and bracing himself for disappointment.

 

So he’s surprised by the shock of color that floods her cheeks, the way she shuffles in place and the awkward play of her hands where they fall from their position at the door and sit stock-still at her sides. _That_ is a look he needs to immortalize: Katniss Everdeen flushed and frazzled.

 

“All right,” she whispers, but it’s louder than anything else, louder than even the thunder of his heart or the chiming of the timers in the back which shatter the moment altogether. He doesn’t manage to say anything else before she flies from the store without making any plans, without exchanging numbers, but it doesn’t matter.

 

He has a date with Katniss Everdeen.

 

_God. Damn._

 

**XXX**

They’re cleaning up at the end of the day and it still hasn’t sunk in.

 

_I have a date with Katniss Everdeen._

He can’t turn his thoughts off:

 

_What should I make?_

_Cheese buns, of course._

_She liked the goat’s cheese tarts when we were kids, too._

_Hell, make a couple of those, as well._

 

“Peeta? Peeta!”

 

Peeta jumps, hitting his head on the sharp underside of the cabinets lining the walls.

 

His fingers fly to the burgeoning bump just at the edge of his hairline as he winces in pain. “Fuck—what the hell, Rye?”

 

Rye crosses his arms, an amused grin tugging at the corners of his mouth. “You’ve been standing there, staring into nothing for five minutes now, Peet. Care to share what’s on your mind with the rest of the class?”

 

Rye glances down at the sink and Peeta’s gaze follows. He sees his fingers, wrinkled and pruned, still clutching at a cookie tray beneath the cooling water. He makes a mental note to make yet another request for dishwashers. He can understand older equipment just fine—appreciate it, even—but that doesn’t mean his father should keep them all dwelling in the Dark Ages with their stupid sink and ratty sponge.

 

Peeta lifts the tray out of the water and sets it down on the rack. “I’m… I guess I’m a bit distracted.”

 

“Yeah, no shit.” His brother whips the dish towel over his shoulder and leans back against the bench. “Something on your mind?”

 

It’s the closest he and his brothers—and his father, for that matter—come to having heart-to-hearts. A rough, hesitant invitation to talk, no judgments or recriminations if they do or don’t. If his mother were still there, Peeta imagines they’d all be suffering in silence, but sometimes he doesn’t know which would be better.

 

“Is it Katniss?”

 

Peeta can’t remember when his crush on Katniss became an open secret.

 

“And if it is?” Peeta hedges.

 

“Then I’d say it’s about fucking time.”

 

As much as he’d like to make his brother beg for the information, his reactions to Katniss have always been far beyond his control. He doesn’t even try to stop the grin that lights his face at the memory of that afternoon and finally earning that _yes_.

 

A punch on his shoulder jostles him from the memory, but the warm glow of it remains.

 

“Fuck, Peet! It’s been how long? Twenty years?”

 

Now the warmth means something completely different.

 

“It was never the right time,” he says in his defence.

 

“So what made today different?”

 

Peeta thinks back to the perfect light, her small, shy smile, and the burst of confidence he’d felt at having it aimed at him for no reason other than Katniss allowing it.

 

“Everything.”

 

Rye snorts, slapping Peeta’s shoulder before resuming his drying duties. “I’m happy for you, Peeta.”

 

Peeta’s pretty happy for himself, too. “Thanks.”

 

“So how long do you think you’ll wait before asking her out on a second date?”

 

“Fuck off, Rye.”

 

**XXX**

The early fall evenings are still tinged with just enough residual summer warmth that packing them a picnic to share seems like a perfect idea.

 

He wraps up apple and goat’s cheese tarts and more cheese buns than he’ll need up in paper towels and places them atop containers of chopped fruits and salads already sitting in the waiting wicker basket. He’s had the basket since he was a child—hell, he reckons it belonged to his dad when he was a child—but he’s spruced it up with a coat of paint and replaced the fabric liner with a soft, forest-green cotton. Now it looks as good as new.

 

He hears a timid knock at the door and feels all the breath in him disappear in a rush. There’s only one person that could be. His hands go clammy, he feels cold and hot in turn, the blood in his head rushes downwards, leaving him dizzy and confused as rapid-fire questions surge through him:

 

_Why did he ask Katniss Everdeen out?_

_Why did that seem like it might be a good idea?_

_Hell, what possessed her to say_ yes _?_

 

She knocks again, and this time it’s like new air has filled him. The terror and trepidation gives way to excitement and anticipation. He grabs the basket in hand and laughs to himself, an incredulous, dizzy sound: he has a date with _Katniss Everdeen_!

 

The third knock, more impatient this time, tumbles him into action. Peeta, basket in hand, bolts through the bakery’s kitchen door and lunges the final three steps to unlock the front door and let her in.

 

She stumbles up to him with her shy eyes downcast, dressed in a gauzy dress the color of sunset covered by a soft, white cardigan. Peeta can’t remember a time he ever saw her wear anything but jeans or trousers with a grubby shirt. If he thought she looked pretty before, she looks radiant now.

 

The basket falls to the floor, the thump accompanied by the rattle of shattering china. He doesn’t care.

 

“You look lovely,” he tells her, awed, even though he’s sure the word doesn’t do her justice.

 

Her cheeks flush, and beneath the embarrassment, he thinks he can see a flicker of pride. “Thank you.” She looks him up and down, a tiny smile on her face. “You look nice, too.”

 

He wants to laugh; if only she knew how he probably spent more time getting ready for tonight that she did. The state of his bedroom rivals that of a teenage girl’s: trousers strewn everywhere, shirts hanging from every vertical surface. He’s still not even sure about the sky-blue shirt and dark jeans he settled on.

 

“Thanks,” he says.

 

“I wasn’t sure if you were going to answer the door,” she remarks, the barest hint of a teasing smile lighting her lips.

 

He chuckles and decides not to mention the scant half-second he’d considered dropping everything and running for the hills. “Sorry. I was packing us a picnic. I thought we could go down to the meadow? We should be finished before it gets too dark.”

 

A look of deep consideration crosses over her face.

 

“That sounds nice,” she says after a long moment. She ducks down to the basket and reaches out a hand to lift the lid. “What’ve you packed?”

 

“Uh-uh.” He wiggles a teasing finger at her. “No peeking until we get there.” He doesn’t even think before he takes her hand in his and pulls her upright.

 

For a heart-stopping moment, the touch renders him speechless. He wonders if she can feel it, too: that tangible, heated thrill of energy between them.

 

By her sudden, shy silence, he thinks she might.

 

He lets her go, far too soon for his liking, and reaches around her to push the door open. “Do you want to grab anything before we go? I packed some iced tea, but I wasn’t sure—”

 

“—Iced tea is fine,” she cuts in.

 

“Good,” he says, his voice smoother than he feels. “Shall we?”

 

He gestures to the door and watches as she clutches the cardigan tighter around her waist and flies on through. Peeta pauses to take a deep, fortifying breath before following her out.

 

It’s not too far to walk from the bakery to the meadow on the other side of town, but the oppressive, awkward silence makes part of him think maybe they should have taken the car.

 

The other part couldn’t be happier to have Katniss walking side-by-side with him, on the way to dinner. It’s too surreal; he loves it.

 

The hand not wrapped around the basket’s handle gets shoved into his pocket to keep from doing anything moronic, like reaching out and taking her hand.

 

“Hey, Katniss?”

 

Her head twitches, the only indication she heard him.

 

“Do you mind if I ask you something?”

 

She shrugs and kicks at a stone in their path. “Sure, I guess.”

 

“I was curious about your little purse.”

 

She gives him an odd look. “My purse? You’re curious about my purse?”

 

“Yeah, the little sequined one you had when you came in the other day.”

 

Her breath hitches in her throat as her gaze flies back to the ground. “Oh, that one.”

 

“It’s just… it doesn’t look like something you’d have, you know?”

                                                              

A flash of irritation crosses over her, darkening her eyes from silver to deep, stormy gray. “What sort of purse did you think I’d have?”

 

He gives an awkward laugh. “I don’t know. Plain black leather, maybe? Not multi-colored sequins, that’s for sure.”

 

She lets out a deep breath; he watches her internal batter wage itself across her face. “It’s not mine. Not really, anyway. It was Prim’s.”

 

Peeta’s stomach drops. He halts in his tracks, then jogs after her when she doesn’t stop.  “Oh.”

 

She nods, but doesn’t say anything to chastise him. “Prim loved all things shiny and gaudy. She had a hell of a costume jewelry collection, too. I got the little purse for her birthday, just before she… yeah.”

 

“Yeah.”

 

She lets out a sigh and pulls her shoulders back to stand just that little bit straighter. “Anyway, it was still brand new, and I needed a new one since mine was falling apart, so I figured, since Prim wasn’t going to use it, I might as well…”

 

He dips his head. “I’m sorry, Katniss.”

 

“No, don’t be. You didn’t know. And you’re right; it’s not something I’d choose for myself.” She smiles to herself. “I probably would go for the plain black leather. But I like having something of Prim around. Makes me feel like she’s still with me, you know?”  


They move closer after that, shoulders and hands brushing with each step they take. Again, Peeta gets that vague feeling of having crossed some sort of threshold, but again he’s got no idea what it is or what it means.

 

The meadow moves into sight, bright yellows and pinks vying for attention.

 

He stops at the edge of it and gestures out. “Well, here we are.”

 

Katniss quirks a brow at him. “I suppose so.” She looks around the field and moves to a spot less packed with dense blooms, turns and fixes him with an expectant look. “Did you bring a blanket?”

 

Peeta freezes. He is such an _idiot_.  “Crap, I forgot.” He sets the basket down and turns away to leave. “Wait here, I’ll go back real quick and get one.”

 

“Peeta!” Her hand lands on his forearm, searing him again. He stares at the slender shape of it, at the bitten fingernails, holds back a smile at the hurried swipe of pale pink polish she must have given herself before arriving.

 

“I’m sure we’ll be fine.” Katniss pulls her hand away and strips of her cardigan, laying it down on the ground and sitting on it. “Now, show me what you brought.”

 

He’s never felt more unsure about a movement in his entire life, but he leaves a good deal of distance between them as he sits across from her. He reaches into the basket to pull everything out, rattling off an itemized list as he does so.

 

Her face lights up with each successive thing announced, ending on a wide grin when he pulls out the tarts.

 

“You remembered,” she marvels.

 

“I remember all sorts of things,” he teases her as he hands her a plate.

 

“Oh?” He watches Katniss pile her plate high, tarts and cheese buns in a precarious stack in the middle of a pile of salads. “Like what?”

 

Peeta fills his cup with the tea and drains it in one mouthful, wondering if perhaps he should have added something stronger, more fortifying.

 

“I remember,” he begins before he can second guess himself, “all the words to just about the whole Spice Girls back catalogue. Hazards of going to school in the nineties, I guess.”

 

She laughs, and he feels like he just won the lottery.

 

“Same,” she tells him. “But…uh, Backstreet Boys.”

 

His turn to laugh. “Seriously?”

 

She nods, cheeks blushing. “Seriously.” She stabs a piece of melon onto her fork and shoves it into her mouth. “So what else do you remember?”

 

He pours another cup of tea and sips on it contemplatively. “Let’s see… I remember the time Cato Rollins got drunk when we were fourteen and threw up in class the next day.”

 

She chuckles again. “Hard one to forget, since I was sitting in front of him at the time.”

 

He remembers that, too, having spent the better part of his schooling life in the row behind her, one seat to the left so he could watch her profile from the corner of his eye while he sketched. Peeta takes another gulp of his tea and takes a deep breath.

 

“I also remember… the first time I ever saw you.”

 

“At school?”

 

He shakes his head and gets to work on his own plate, stabbing at a slice of cucumber with more animosity than the fruit deserves. “No, before that. You used to come into the bakery with your father when he would sell us the vanilla.”

 

“I only came in once or twice,” she points out, like he doesn’t already know. “Not long before school started.”

 

“I remember,” he says again. “You smiled at me from behind your dad’s legs. You were wearing this adorable red plaid dress, and you wore your hair in two braids.

 

“You smiled at me,” he goes on, staring at his food, “and I remember thinking you had the prettiest smile I’d ever seen. I wanted to talk to you then, but you ran back behind your dad’s legs. I tried again, once school started, but I had no idea what to say. I heard you sing the Valley Song that first day, too, and I wanted to tell you how pretty you sounded, but I think a lot of other people wanted to tell you, too.” He shakes his head at the memory and grins. “You had the whole class hanging off you for the rest of the day.”

 

There’s a beat of silence that feels way too long, then: “You… you have a remarkable memory.”

 

“I remember everything about you,” he replies, just as soft. “You’re the one who wasn’t paying attention.”

 

A silence—not awkward, but not comfortable, either—follows. Peeta clears his throat. “Are you liking the food?” he asks.

 

She nods, but it’s shaky, apprehensive. “Very much, thank you.”

 

His voice is much the same when he asks, “Do you… maybe want anything else?”

 

She gives him an odd look, studying him like she’s seeing him for the very first time. She seems to be cataloguing every part of him. Peeta can’t help but stop breathing, like even the motion of his breaths might be enough to break the moment. When her gaze dips down his face to his lips and lingers there, he thinks he might be able to take the hint.

 

She’s slow and deliberate as she sets her fork and plate down and leans forward on her knees to reach him. He gulps at her proximity even as his skin thrums from it, everything in him tight with anticipation of what might happen next.

 

She sets her soft hands on either side of his face, cradling his cheeks, thumbs stroking back and forth on his temples. Peeta closes his eyes and leans into the touch, his breath leaving him in a shaky rattle. He snatches that breath back in a sharp gasp, though, when Katniss leans in and presses her lips to his.

 

For a long moment, he can’t move. He’s frozen, eyes wide open as he watches her in shock. He can feel when Katniss seizes up, moving backwards, her gaze cold, like he’s betrayed her somehow.

 

_Not on his fucking watch._

 

He remembers how to move, wrapping his arms around her waist and pulling her onto his lap. He tastes strawberries and melon on her lips, heat and desire in the slow, immediate strokes of her tongue against his. She melts against him, dragging them down to the ground, pinning him there in a round he’s all too happy to lose. One hand flies to her braid, running the silky length of it, skimming the skin of her neck with each stroke while the other settles with reverence at her waist, holding her in place as he explores this new, unchartered part of her.

 

He could lose himself on Katniss’ lips; all sense of direction, all sense of right and wrong. And he doesn’t think he cares too much. He could die, here and now, and feel nothing but the rising heat and joy thrumming through his veins.

 

As quickly as it began, it’s all over. Katniss wrenches herself away, shoves him back and shoots to her feet. Peeta scrambles to follow her.

 

She’s tugging at her mussed braid, cheeks flushed a violent red; not the adorable fluster of when he asked her to dinner in the first place, but one of abject horror, of unrelenting panic. “Oh God, I’m sorry! I’m so sorry, Peeta!”

 

“What?” His brain is still foggy, lost in a haze of her scent and feel. “Don’t be sorry, Katniss, not for that!”

 

“I shouldn’t have…” She lunges for her cardigan and seizes it around her shoulders. “I shouldn’t have done that.”

 

“Katniss,” he starts, his voice low. “Please stop and just sit for a minute? What’s wrong?”

 

She shakes her head, pulls the cardigan even tighter, warping the shape. “I have to go now. Thank you for dinner, Peeta. It was really… really nice.” She dashes off with long, graceful strides like a gazelle, picking up speed he can’t even begin to fathom.

 

“Wait—Katniss!” he yells after her.

 

But she’s already gone.

 

**XXX**

Peeta feels like he’s been shoved through a wood chipper and had his pieces sorted back together by someone who doesn’t know him very well. Some parts of him feel too much, others too little, like his skin isn’t the right size anymore.

 

As he pulls open the door of the bakery to start his afternoon shift, frustration rises in him like a tide, washing out and taking over everything in him.

 

“So how’d it go?” Rye calls from the kitchen, forgoing _hello_ and _how are you_. “When are you seeing her again?”

 

Peeta slams the bakery’s door shut in response, rattling the windows in their frames.

 

“Whoa, Peet. Calm down! You all right?”

 

Peeta stalks through the kitchen and into the supply room, where he yanks his waiting apron off its hook.

 

No. Things are not all right.

 

Rye shuffles out of the kitchen, meeting him back there. He leans against the doorframe, his arms crossed, a frown wrinkling his forehead. “I, uh… I take it things didn’t go so great?”

 

Peeta shakes his head and tugs the apron over his head. He reaches behind him and ties the strings into a knot he’s not sure he’ll be able to undo later. “Actually, things were going great, until they weren’t.”

 

Rye gapes at him. “The fuck’s that even mean?”

 

“It means… I was having a great time, I thought she was, too, but then we weren’t.”

 

“You’ve never been one for cryptic, Peet. Why start now?”

 

Peeta lets out a sigh, digging the heels of his hands into his tired, stinging eyes. “I don’t want to talk about it, Rye.”

 

“Okay. Fine.” Rye backs off a few steps, hands raised in front of him in supplication. “It’s just… was it really that bad?”

 

“No!” Peeta snaps. “It was…” He runs his hand down his face, letting the motion drags his eyes closed. “It was wonderful! We talked, just sat together… I kissed her. She kissed me back, but… she apologized and ran off and fuck, Rye, I have no idea what’s going on in her head.”

 

“Uh, you could maybe try talking to her? You know, like a smart person might?”

 

Peeta glares at him, but it’s unpractised, probably not half as menacing as he’d like. “Of course I tried talking to her, you idiot! The first thing I did when I got back was try to call her, but she never picked up or replied to my texts.”

 

Rye sighs, running a hand through his hair. “Shit, Peet. I’m sorry.”

 

Peeta grunts. “Yeah, so am I.”

 

There’s a long pause, then: “You gonna try again?”

 

“What?” Peeta stares at his brother like he’s crazy. “When would I even be able to?”

 

“You’ve gotta get the vanilla from somewhere, right?” Rye points out. “She can’t tell a paying customer—her _only_ paying customer—to piss off, can she?”

 

Peeta wants to laugh. “I think Katniss will do whatever she wants, damn the rest of us.”

 

Rye shakes his head, whipping the towel from off his shoulder back towards the door. “Get outta here for a bit, Peet. Go sit in the park, get some fresh air or whatever. Come back when you’re feeling better.”

 

Peeta can’t find it in himself to argue. He nicks a bottle of water from the stock fridge and grunts with the effort it takes to haul the heavy back door open. He slides back out, hands in pockets, and makes his way towards the park on the other side of the road.

 

It’s a beautiful day out; the blue sky and sunshine go at least a little way to making him feel better. He’s about to cross the road and commandeer a bench when a flash of an ink-black braid stops him in his tracks.

 

She’s there, in the park, jogging the paths in the cool noon light like so many others. He wants to call out to her, almost does until he sees some tall guy jog up beside her, knock her with a friendly elbow. He can hear the guy’s booming laugh at whatever Katniss must have said, and he can just about _feel_ her scowl.

 

They’re together, somehow, but Peeta’s too far away to be able to tell anything with any real certainty. They jog a little while longer before they reach the top of a crested hill, where Katniss halts in her tracks, turning to face the tall guy with her hands set on her hips. Silhouetted against the light, he can see her chest heaving, and he’s pretty sure it’s not just from exertion.

 

Then, Tall, Dark and Mysterious leans down, holds fast to her shoulders, and kisses her, solving the mystery for him. Peeta has to turn away for fear of what might happen if he keeps watching.

 

 _You knew this would happen_ , a slimy, insidious voice that sounds an awful lot like his mother whispers in his ear. _You knew she’d never want you_.

 

Does if even matter if she did or she didn’t? Who cares? She doesn’t now, that much is obvious.

 

He’s got no idea what to do, but he knows he can’t stay there. Peeta ditches his water bottle in a nearby bin and stalks home. Rye can deal with the bakery on his own today.

**XXX**

  
He doesn’t go back to Katniss for vanilla for months. He isn’t sure who he’s trying to spite. He buys it from the local supermarket instead, imported from God knows where, and tries not to think too hard about how artificial it all smells; how it comes in uniform tubes and bottles and not the mismatched old jam jars with handwritten labels Katniss would use.

 

Months pass by, first one, then two, then three. Peeta pours in hundreds of hours of unpaid overtime to distract himself. He hasn’t seen her at all except for the rare, fleeting glimpses he catches when they’re at the shops at the same time. Sometimes their gazes will meet, but it never goes beyond that. Her deer-in-the-headlights look of terror when she sees him doesn’t let her initiate a conversation, say hello, or do so much as wave. But if he’s going to be fair, he hasn’t made any effort either.

 

He’s not angry at her. Annoyed, perhaps, but not angry. He isn’t sure it’s in his capacity to ever be angry with Katniss. Not once over all the years they’ve known each other has he shared how he feels, and not once has she ever led him on with anything more than the promise of her tentative friendship. If there’s anyone to blame for this whole mess, it’s him, a thousand times over.

 

He’s wrecked more batches of dough in the past few weeks than he cares to count. Rough hands seeking an outlet overwork the stuff to the point of uselessness. It does help, though; when he was younger, he could turn to wrestling to work the tension out. As an adult—and a terminally single one at that—that tension has nowhere to go.

 

“Peeta?” His father sidles up beside him with care, whispering his approach so Peeta doesn’t startle like a rabid mutt two seconds away from attacking. Not too far off the truth, Peeta thinks.

 

“Yeah?” he mutters. His lips curl into a snarl when he feels the dough tighten under his hand.

 

“I’ve got that doctor’s appointment now. Your brother’s on break, but if you need help you can—”  


“—I’ll call him back. Right, I know.” It’s a dead Sunday afternoon; he’s not going to call anyone.

 

His father hesitates. “Peeta?”

 

“What?” he snaps.

 

He sighs. “Never mind.”

 

With that, Peeta’s alone again.

 

Peeta closes his eyes and takes a deep breath, feeling the warmth of the kitchen bring him back to somewhere close to normal. His petulance is a new thing, but under it all, under all the hurt and non-understanding, there is a well of guilt so deep he can’t even swim through it; just look at it expand and wonder what the hell to do with it.

 

He ignores it for the time being. Being pissed off with the world is much more immediate and far more satisfying.

 

The bell above the storefront door trills out a happy jingle. He’s about ready to wrench that damn thing from its hook and throw it into one of the wood-fired ovens: the closest thing he can get right now to a pit of hell.

 

He stomps through the doors and sets himself up behind the counter, sullen eyes pointed downwards, peevishness rolling off him like a wave.

 

“Welcome to Mellark’s Bakery, what can I…”

 

The rote greeting, repeated time and time again, dies in his throat at the sight of Katniss before him, back in her jeans and grubby shirt. He wants to tell her she looks beautiful; he also kind of wants to tell her to piss off.

 

“Hello,” she murmurs. “Can we… do you have a few minutes?”

 

He doesn’t answer. Instead, he watches her for a moment, a gross wave of satisfaction washing over him at her awkwardness and discomfort as she stares off at a cabinet and wrings her hands.

 

“Fine,” he says, his tone terse. He wipes his hands off on his apron and crosses his arms. “What do you want to talk about?”

 

He stares at her as she draws in a series of quick, deep breaths. “So…” she starts, “I haven’t seen you in a while.”

 

Peeta shrugs. “Haven’t needed to.”

 

A flash of hurt darkens her face, and he regrets his words for maybe half a second.

 

“Yeah, I…” She trails off, stares down at the ground, scowls. “Look, I’ve been thinking about it—for a while now, actually—and I feel like I might owe you an apology.”

 

He shakes his head and moves to turn away from her. He doesn’t need her pity, never has. “You don’t owe me a thing, Katniss.”

 

She reaches out across the narrow counter and sets a hand on his arm, stopping him in place. He feels that burn, that thrill at her touch, but now he’s got no idea what to do with it.

 

“But I do,” she asserts. “I think we maybe got our lines crossed before.”

 

“Before?” He laughs, the sound without humor. “Katniss, this was all _months_ ago. It doesn’t even matter anymore.”

 

“It does,” she insists, gray eyes alight. “Can we please just sit down and talk about this properly?”

 

Not once, in the entire time he’s felt the way he does for her, has he ever considered his feelings for Katniss a weakness. If anything, he always thought they made him better: more patient, more tolerant and understanding, stronger in every way that counts.

 

But by the way he crumples at the pleading look on her face, maybe they do make him weak.

 

“Fine.”

 

He turns back into the kitchen, not waiting for her to follow him, not even waving for her to do so. It feels like a minute passes before he hears the familiar creak of the door, the shuffle of her worn shoes dragging on the stone floors, then another minute before she speaks.

 

“First off, I’m sorry.”

 

His laugh is bitter as he takes another lump of dough to work. Shortcrust pastry this time, for the savory tarts; here’s hoping he doesn’t fuck these up, too. “You’re sorry?”

 

“Yes, I am.”

 

His snort this time is snide and disbelieving—he hardly knows who he is when these feelings take over.

 

She glares at him, the weight of it hot at the back of his head. “I’m trying here, Peeta.”

 

He tosses the kneaded ball onto the counter, sending up a plume of flour in its wake, then turns to her and crosses his arms. “And why is that, exactly?”

 

She shifts again, opening and closing her mouth until she manages, “Because… because I want to.”

 

Peeta shakes his head. “You don’t have to bother, Katniss. I won’t hold it against you.”

 

“What are you talking about?” She scowls, that ever familiar one taking up so many pages in his sketchbooks. “I’m just trying to apologize!”

 

“I saw you kiss him, all right?” he snaps. “I don’t know what you’re trying to do, but it doesn’t matter anymore.”

 

Bewilderment takes over her face, contorting her pretty features. “Kiss? Who did I kiss?”

 

Peeta shrugs. “I don’t know. Tall, dark, handsome. In the park the day after we went out.”

 

Katniss slumps, falling back against a counter, no doubt printing a line of flour on the back of her top. “Gale. You saw me kiss Gale.”

 

“Is that his name?” It rings a vague bell. “Then yes, I suppose I did.”

 

“Peeta, Gale’s just… a friend. He and I aren’t… we never…” She sighs and collapses her body forward, holding her head in her hands. “He and I are just friends. I didn’t want him to kiss me. He just did.”

 

The imploring, honest look she gives him goes a long way to assuaging his ire, but not all the way.

 

“All right, so you aren’t with Gale. Fine. But why did you say yes?” he demands.

 

Katniss freezes, glancing at him with wide, wary eyes. “What do you mean?”

 

“I mean, if this was all some sort of joke to you, why did you even say yes to dinner with me to begin with?”

 

“It wasn’t a joke! It was… it was just dinner, Peeta,” she murmurs.

 

“Not to me!” He slams a random spatula to the floor where it lands with a sharp clatter. He sees her flinch and cower away from the crash; guilt washes over him settling like lead in his stomach. That’s what he’s always been afraid of: the anger inside him, just like his mother. He takes a long, deep breath and takes a tentative step forward. When she doesn’t move away, he reaches out and takes her hand. His resolve to ignore her dissolves with every passing second of her hand in his.

 

“It wasn’t just dinner for me. It never could have been just dinner, Katniss.”

 

“Then what was it?” she asks, her tone matching his for softness. “What were we doing, Peeta?”

 

“We were getting to know each other a little better, I thought!” he exclaims. “I’d wanted to get to know you a little better… forever.”

 

She lets out a sorrowful cry. “Damn it, Peeta, why do you say things like that?”

 

He furrows his brows. “Things like what, Katniss?”

 

“Things that give me hope, damn you!” she explodes. “I don’t deserve you. God, I don’t even come close, but I can’t… I can’t feel like this anymore!”

 

A little thorn of hope grabs at him, snagging his heart in place. God, he wants to clip it back so it can’t fucking hurt him anymore.

 

“Like what?” he whispers. “What can’t you feel anymore?”

 

“I just mean… it wasn’t…” Her head falls forward with a sigh. “It wasn’t just dinner for me, either, okay?” she whispers.

 

Everything in him shoots to attention at that, because there’s no way— _no fucking way_ —she just said what he thinks she just said, and no way she means what he thinks she means. “What?”

 

She shuffles in place, her gaze planted on the ground, unwavering. “You heard me, Peeta. It’s just…” She trails off, huffing her exasperation. “You were so nice, and I panicked, and I just… I didn’t know what to do, Peeta!”

 

“You talk to me! You can talk to me about these things, Katniss, because it’s the exact same for me!”

 

“The same for you?” she repeats, sarcastic. “You panic around me? You don’t know what to say? Please. You’re so friendly and nice to everyone. _Everyone_. What the hell makes me so different?”

 

“You really don’t know, do you?”

 

“Know what, Peeta?”

 

“The effect you have. On me. On everyone.”

 

She’s quiet for a moment, like she’s contemplating his words. “You told me,” she starts, “on our… _date_ , that I was the one not paying attention. You’re wrong, Peeta. I was always paying attention to you.”

 

His stunned silence follows; he doesn’t think his brain could make words now even if it was trying.

 

“What?” he says—or hopes he says.

 

“You’re a painter,” she starts, voice low. “You’re a baker. You never take sugar in your tea. And you always double-knot your shoelaces.”

 

Peeta feels like he might have to scrape his jaw from the floor.

 

“I, um… I also sleep with my windows open.” At her odd look, he shrugs. “In case you were keeping tabs.”

 

Her laugh is incredulous. His grin is sure to match.

  
“I like you, Katniss,” he tells her, the words far easier to get out than he expected. He steps closer, so the toes of his boots knock against the scuffed whites of her old Cons. “A lot.”

 

Her expression wars between wary and hopeful, and it’s one of the most beautiful things he’s ever seen. “You do?”

 

He nods, the purest sort of contentment washing over him. “Yeah, I do.”

 

He ducks his head to meet her eyes, fingers slipping under her chin to tilt her up. “And you like me, too,” he whispers, pressing closer to her lips. “Real or not real?”

 

She leans into him, closing the last three, two, one inches. “Real, Peeta,” she whispers on his lips. “It’s always been real.”

 

**XXX**

It’s a little while down the track before he shows her his drawings. Far from being horrified, like he’d believed for so long she would be, she was impressed. Embarrassed, certainly, but when he watched her trace her fingers around the charcoal outlines, reverence had taken over her features.

 

It had been her to suggest she pose for him, because he’d never ask. _Nothing weird or… naked_ , she’d stipulated right from the beginning, her lips twisted in the scowl he loves. But she’d sit for him, however else he liked.

 

He doesn’t take her up on it until they next picnic in the meadow, nearly a year to the day since the first time. He didn’t even leave with her that day with the intention of asking. It happens when he’s feeding her strawberries; his favorite shade of sunset orange lighting her from behind, the gentle breeze picking up stray wisps of her hair, a serene smile pulling gently at her lips. The scene, the light, and the subject is perfect.

 

And drifting away all too quickly.

 

Peeta drops the berries and wrenches the pad and pencils out of his bag, and begins like a man possessed, like he might lose the urge if he stops for even a second. He draws out her braid, her eyes, the slope of her shoulders; he can even sketch out the curve of her breasts now without feeling like the world’s biggest pervert.

 

When he’s finished, he can’t breathe. It’s his best yet.

 

Because this time she’s smiling at him.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I still feel like there's something major missing from this story, but I've got no idea what that something is... Maybe it needed smut, I don't know...
> 
> I'm ally147writes on Tumblr if you want to talk :)


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